I speak in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh; for as you presented your members as servants to uncleanness and to wickedness upon wickedness, even so now present your members as servants to righteousness for sanctification.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 19. I speak a human thing, [2] or I am proposing to you what is according to human strength and ability assisted by the grace of God, with a due regard to the weakness and infirmity of your flesh. The sense, according to Saint John Chrysostom is this, that the apostle having told them they must be dead to sin, lead a new life, and so forth he now encourages them to it, by telling them, that what is required of them is not above their human strength, as it is assisted by those graces which God offers them, and which they have received. Where we may observe that these words, I speak a human thing, are not the same, nor to be taken in the same sense, as cap. 3:6 when he said, I speak after a human way, or I speak like men. Witham.—What I ask of you, Christian Romans, is, that you so earnestly labour for your sanctification as to improve daily in virtue, as formerly you plunged every day deeper and deeper into vice. Menochius.